skating

Way back in the '80s when I was a youngster living in Durham, NC, the hot place to go in town was the roller rink, Wheels. How many hours of roller skating pleasure did I enjoy during those years? I even had my own skates! They were navy blue with a white stripe. I was fast for my age, but longed to be really fast like the older, skinny guys who zipped around the rink like Tron, their mullets flapping along behind them.

Turns out Wheels is still around. It's now the Wheels Family Fun Center and, according to the reviews on Citysearch, they're probably still using the same old skates they used when I used to go there. Sure, it was a dump, but it was an awesome dump.

But I digress, I came on here to write about gay skate. That was SO FUN. (Honestly, I'm getting a little bored with all these posts about how FUN everything was. Really. How much FUN can a girl have in one lifetime?) I was a little wobbly at first, but pretty soon it all came back to me and I was zipping around the rink with the best of them (and there were some good ones there, including some chicks from roller derby). I even went onto the floor for women's fast-skate. It was awesome!

I fell twice, but didn't get hurt at all (which I added to my list of reasons why I *could* go out for roller derby). Once I fell because my leg just seized up and wouldn't go where my brain was telling it to go. I lifted my foot up to do a crossover on a turn and my muscles just froze. I thought "I'm going down." And I just plopped right down on my ass and then waited for a whole herd of rollerskaters to roll over me. Fortunately that didn't happen. Later I tripped over a guy who bit it right in front of me. We were both ok, and then this super-butch "referee" came over and stood behind us to shield us from on-coming traffic while we sorted ourselves out. That was nice.

I saw lots and lots of people I know, INCLUDING THAT WOMAN FROM HOBO'S! Crazy, huh? Out of her Hobo's element (and out of her hot Hobo's uniform, black button up shirt, black pants) she didn't seem quite as alluring. Also, her friends seemed really young, so I wondered if maybe I'd entirely misjudged her character. At some point I decided I'd go talk to her about having hit on her, but she ended up leaving early so it didn't happen. Oh well.

There were also lots of chicks from my lesbian breakfast club there. They're pretty great women, so it was nice to float past them or stop to chat. And, of course, my kayakers were all there in full force. Kara, unsurprisingly, is a very strong skater. It was fun to chase her and I felt a deep sense of accomplishment when I managed to catch up and pace her. Adventure Girl, being who she is, was capable of speed, but she ended up slowing down to stick with MFW most of the night, keeping her company and giving her "lessons." Hmm. And Maia, god bless her, was like the little engine that could. She started out slow and ended up just marginally faster, but she kept chugging along. She said she was having fun and we all agreed to do it every month. It was great exercise.

Today my leg muscles are all crampy and I have blisters on the bottoms of my feet, but I don't care. It was worth it.

In other news, Gully keeps calling and text-messaging me. It seems she can't get Friday night out of her mind. Hmm. What's up with that? It's almost too much, to be honest. And Mahavira wrote me back. She didn't check my references, she didn't ask me any questions, she didn't even request a picture. She said, "Sure, let's get drinks. Are you free this week?" Wow. That was easy. It's kind of amazing, really, how things are all just coming together lately. Hope it lasts...